Communication Skills: Rating 5.0 / 5.0

Presents ideas effectively and conveys thoughts clearly and concisely. Communicates well in writing.

Communication Skills: Geof does a great deal of work outside of TBE in the areas of announcing and reporting. These interests and talents have provided him outlets to sharpen his ability to effectively convey wrtten and verbal thoughts clearly and concisely. It is my experience that gifted engineers and technical professions rarely have exceptional communication skills. Geof’s communication skills are well respected on our team as he often called upon to edit charts, documents, memos and emails

[Please note that the errors above aren't mine. I joked with my boss that he was probably pissed that I couldn't review all his employee evals. He nodded, laughed, and walked out of my office.]

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I do a lot of wacky stuff outside of my engineering nerddom: broadcasting hockey, hockey public address [hopefully more of that next season], Web stuff, etc. Writing and communicating is what I probably do best. Dr. Szilagyi was right: I would have made a great English major. [And if you're reading that, shaking your head, and parsing my grammar: remember, I wasn't one.]

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The funniest bit of non-managerial praise I’ve gotten lately was when a colleague hopped in my office the other day astonished at the depth of meeting minutes I’d prepared for a telecon we’d had last Thursday. “I could never have done that! Reading that was pretty much like being there.” Well, you’d hope that I’d have learned what good minutes look like in parts of eight years of Student Government. [I really want to stay and finish these minutes tonight while they're fresh on my brain, but I've been working proposals for the last hour-and-a-half and have a presing engagement tonight to boot.]

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When I hired in as a co-op, and when I was hired as a full-timer, my extracurricular choices—Student Government and hockey broadcasting—were cited as reasons that I stood above the pack. I make no bones about my technical skills: I’m merely an above average engineer. I’d argue that I’m average-to-below average, but I can’t convince my manager of that fact. Maybe I’m bluffing, or maybe I don’t recognize my own competence.

[I think this comes from having a lot of friends who have Ph.D.'s and advanced degrees and feel inferior due to my shitty study skills and desire to do a lot of wacky things outside of my job, all of which keep me from being preternaturally focused on graduate school, which is what you have to do in order to work full-time and do graduate school. If I'm honest, my disappointment with MSMS alumni is disappointment with self.]

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I keep going back to that whole “clearly and concisely” bit and find that it’s not often true, that I’m circumferential and allusive and elusive and meandering. [Have you had a conversation with me that's lasted over ten minutes, uninterrupted? You're nodding.] But I guess I’m back to that old saw:

Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man, and writing an exact man.

– Sir Francis Bacon

Exactly what all the above is, I don’t know for sure. But the little performance eval did certainly start some wheels churning.